Oscars: Every Best Picture Winner Ever Ranked From Worst To Best
30. Birdman Or (The Unexpected Virtue Of Ignorance) (2014)
Though Alejandro G. Iñárritu's stylistically audacious drama released to rave reviews, its stature in the pantheon of Best Picture winners is a little more complicated.
The backlash against Birdman purports it to be a pretentious movie which substitutes style for substance, girded as it is by Emmanuel Lubezki's gonzo lensing and its "one shot" gimmickry.
Still, if you're prepared to dive down the rabbit hole with Iñárritu, Birdman does emerge as one of the more adventurous and imaginative Best Picture winners ever. It may not amount to much in terms of the human condition or contemporary politics, but as a fun back-patting riff on modern entertainment and performance, it's a real corker.
Michael Keaton, Emma Stone and Edward Norton do some of their best recent work in it, if you needed an extra nudge.